I was also going to suggest rolling onto your side before sitting up. If that doesn't help, maybe taking the flat bench exercises out of your workout and using an incline bench instead would be an option?

Coach Jen

"You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call "failure" is not the falling down but the staying down." Mary Pickford

"No matter how slow you go, you are still lapping everybody on the couch."

It wasn't until this past year that I started having a problem getting up after doing a flat bench exercise. I can't rise myself up and off the bench without hurting my back.

I've twinged and pulled muscles. I'm short (5'0" tall). My feet can't touch the floor. I have bent my knees and placed my feet flat at the bottom of the bench when I do flat bench exercises. Tried placing steppers on both sides of the bench, parallel to the bench for me to rest my feet on but that didn't help.

Does anybody have any suggestions on what I can do to get off the bench without hurting my back short of having a trapeze bar to grab to help lift me up or a motorized bench that will lift me up off the bench?

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